The Puffer Forum

Hello! I have a 55 gallon aquarium with 1 adult Green Spotted Puffer, I never knew it was Aiptasia, and it has been there for a very long time, but there's Aiptasia growing all over my live rock. Every single piece, and some pieces are larger than the puffer himself. Is Aiptasia dangerous? I am aware of it possibly stinging fish and stressing other corals, how much harm does it present in a FOWLR setup with one fish?

Thanks!

This is something i've found just looking online to get ride of it. Lots of topics were saying it is BAD for the aquarium. I'll copy and paste below, most pages show the same treatment. I enjoy reading up on this stuff as i am going to be setting up a full marine tank soon enough. If anyone else has anything else to say please reply.

What Do You Do?
Aiptasia is most easily controlled when first observed in the tank. New live rock and corals should be inspected before placing in the tank. Over time, they will spread and make eradication harder. Control takes 2 main forms:

1) Chemical Control - The anemones are assaulted with an injection or slathering of a caustic substance.

A product on the market called Aiptasia Stop is a concoction of pepper juice which when injected rapidly kills the anemone. I have used this product and it works well when it can be injected. It is stated to be safe to other tank inhabitants and I have used it around clams, corals, etc. without any harm being done so their claims seem to have merit..

Inject with a caustic solution made from a concentrated Kalk solution or similar.

Inject with hot (near boiling) water.

The problem with the injection approach is that it is difficult to get to some anemones to inject them, and they don't just sit around waiting for you to complete the task. They are very adept at retreating into the rock. It does give you a certain amount of satisfaction when you do nail them however. This approach also does not help much with the small ones.


2) Biological Control - The approach taken here is to introduce animals into the tank that will eat the Aiptasia. There are not a lot of animals that like to eat them however.

Copperbanded butterflyfish are sometimes good aiptasia eradicators and sometimes they are completely worthless. It appears to depend upon the specific fish. I know LFS that routinely rotate Copperbandeds in their tanks to keep the aiptasia in check. My results have been less stellar.

Other Fish such as Raccoon butterflyfish also eat Aiptasia, but tend to eat small soft corals as well, so they are not recommended for use in a reef tank.

Peppermint shrimp Lysmata wurdemanni are small pink to reddish lightly stripped shrimp that sometimes do a good job on the aiptasia. I have found that some shrimp are voracious eaters and some seem to pay the aiptasia no attention at all. These have done the job in my tanks and appear to be harmless to the desirable corals and clams for the most part. There have been reports that they will eat corals that look similar to aiptasia, such as yellow polyps, so this is something to watch for. The larger adult shrimp may be better Aiptasia eaters than the juveniles per my experience.

Nudibranches of the species Berghia verrucicornis from Caribbean waters are sometimes used to eat aiptasia. There is much speculation as to which ones really work and there appears to be much confusion over which ones are which. In any case the nudibranches die as soon as their food supply is depleted which is unfortunate.